Our Frailer Thoughts
by Ku-chyan
Summary: It’s once burned, twice shy, but being in love or whatever this is isn’t so much about the flame as it is about the warmth. ---Lucky/Sam---


So far I've stuck mostly to Spinelli and Maxie, and not much into other character at all…but I wanted to do something LuSam because…well, just because. And I needed a break from Spixie, because too much makes it hard to write. This is a little OOC, I know, and let me tell you that this was several different stories pasted over each other. It's alright, but sometimes the flow just doesn't happen. It was fun though! And as usual with me, it's not very long.

Un-betaed! So please, point out any mistakes I missed so I can fix them.

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**Our Frailer Thoughts**  
Lucky/Sam

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The color red feels like winter, joyful glittering baubles, scalded fingers, bright cheeks illuminated in a fiery glow. It's winter now, and Sam looks cold in her red dress.

Lucky kisses her hand in a way that's achingly sweet and not entirely truthful. "You look beautiful, Sam."

"Thanks." Things aren't awkward between them. They should be – by all means things should be over, but everything is the same as it was before, only cleaner. The stinging, painful clean that comes with truth has left them little, but they still have this. It helps that they're both good at pretending.

When they're old and gray they'll probably have forgotten each other, but one thing Lucky has learned is that you can't dwell on the past, or count on the future. You've got to live in the present, the here, the now. And right now, Sam looks as lonely as he feels.

But tonight's not a night for being lonely. It's not a night for thinking about what they used to have, or what they could have had, or the things they'll never have. Tonight's one of those nights for new beginnings, the kind where nothing from before matters; not that day, not that week, not the previous month, year, or even the entirely of your life. It's just a night for starting fresh. Clean slates and empty closets.

He's Lucky, the good intentioned but never quite good enough cop.

Sam is a childless mother who knows all too well that _wanting to be good_ and actually _being good_ are two very, very different things.

Things shouldn't work between them. Maybe they won't. But Sam looks beautiful when she smiles at him, when she cries into his chest, when she glances at him from beneath lowered lashes. And god, Lucky is more than willing to try.

Sometimes Sam sees him, and she's surprised. After everything, he's with her? A guy like him with a girl like her? A cop and a con? That's wrong. It's all wrong. Sam wants it so bad, she's sure it's just a matter of time before she ruins it.

They're eating dinner, just the two of them, and if it were any other two people it would be like a normal date. But they're Sam McCall and Lucky Spencer, and there's _nothing_ normal about that. The whole time, always, as usual, Lucky finds himself wanting to say _I can't be him, I've never been him, and I'll never be able to be him_. But he doesn't, can't , because maybe she hasn't realized it yet, and maybe she'll leave when she does. Maybe that will become a running theme in his life. And maybe he's damned because he didn't mean for it to turn out like this, but he's started to realize that he really, really likes being with Sam. Blasphemy, almost. He is a Spencer, after all, and she's a Cassadine, whether people remember the fact or not. There's a thrill to that somehow, and while he eats his steak he thinks that maybe Lulu has been onto something with all her Romeo-and-Juliet-esque romances.

"What are you so happy about?" Sam laughs, looking amused. "That must be a really good steak."

Lucky shrugs. "I was just thinking." He stopped to mock glare at her _ooh,ahh_ and overly impressed look. "Just thinking," he continued, "that you're a Cassadine ,really. And I'm a Spencer."

Sam chewed her paste carefully. "And?" she asked. She didn't look particularly worried, but Lucky liked to think he'd grown to know her better than that in the last few months.

"It doesn't really matter to me." Lucky reassured her. He took her smaller hand in his. "I just don't think my dad's realized it yet. Like it hasn't clicked in his head. I was imagining the look on his face when he does. It's bad enough I'm a cop, right?"

Sam laughed and rubbed Lucky's knuckles affectionately. "I like to think that I've proved myself as a person beyond my bloodline. You know, technically, I've only been a Cassadine for a couple of years now."

"But you've always been Sam." Lucky said, pressing his lips to her palms.

"I've always been Sam when it mattered." She agreed. "Like now."

And Lucky is not stupid. He's not naïve. He's not as oblivious as people seem to think. He knows that logic says this won't end well, but that doesn't stop him from wanting. Nothing would, not here, when Sam is smiling at him over candles and he can't quite remember why it's a bad idea .

Lucky leaves a set of night clothes at Sam's apartment. They're for the morning, really, and not so much for the actual night. It's sweet, though, and it means something. Something. Sam sends them to be cleaned with her clothes and when they come back she makes sure they're folded just right. When she puts them in their place in her drawer she thinks, _this must mean something_.

The thing is, neither of them is sure what to do. It's like them against the world, except less dramatic, or maybe more. Lucky had Elizabeth for how long? And Jason had been the first time that Sam wanted, really, really wanted—and now this is something completely different for both of them. And who in Port Charles even thinks it's real?

It's once burned, twice shy, but being in love or whatever this is isn't so much about the flame as it is about the warmth. He won't sit on the edge of the bed and sing her love songs he hasn't finished finding the words for and she won't cry into his shoulder over the perfect tragedy of Rhett and Scarlett, because he's not that boy and she's not that girl. Not anymore. And that's okay. Because it didn't work out those times and this, what they have now, is all about something else entirely.


End file.
